12:09 COVID-19'S temporary and permanent impact on consumer behavior

20:40 Misconceptions around supply chain innovation and growth

23:50 Connection between supply chain logistics and customer centricity

31:00 Concerns around last mile delivery and where it is heading

40:15 How women are impacting supply chain

44:26 Optimism for future supply innovation and growth

Follow the host:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrewlmurray/

Follow the guests:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/rod-thomas-a409a41/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/stephaniethomasuark/

Follow the initiative:

https://www.linkedin.com/company/customer-centric-leadership-initiative-sam-m-walton-college-of-business/

They need to be customer centric and think about how does a

customer use this product?

What are the service implications of not having this on the shelf?

It's very different to be out of stock on potato chips, which sunflower oil is

a key product and baby formula, right?

To me, I think we need to think of our supply chains.

We gotta look at the products and how customers use those.

And we need to segment our supply chains and treat them differently based on how

customers are impacted by those products.

So for life saving and life sustaining products, medicine, food, water,

I absolutely think we need to make sure resilience is top of mind.

Hi, I'm Andy Murray.

Welcome to it's a customer's world podcast.

Now more than ever, retailers and brands are accelerating their

quest to be more customer center.

But to be truly customer-centric it requires both a shift in mindset and

ways of working, not just in marketing, but in all parts of the organization.

In this podcast series, I'll be talking with practitioners, thought leaders

and scholars to hear their thoughts on what it takes to be a leader

in today's customer centric world.

In today's episode, I'm joined by professors, Rodney and Stephanie Thomas,

Rodney received his PhD in supply chain and marketing from the university

of Tennessee, and currently serves as the director of the undergraduate

supply chain management program at the Walton college of business.

Stephanie who earned her PhD in supply chain management.

From Georgia.

Southern is also a professor at the Walton college of business and

is the executive director of women impacting supply chain excellence.

In our conversation, we connect the dots between supply chain logistics and

customer centricity, both Rodney and Stephanie have executive level experience

in big retail, which gives them a unique perspective on the nuances of the supply

chain issues challenging business today.

We talked quite a bit about how a customer-centric mindset can lead to

supply chain innovation that builds resiliency as well as efficiency.

Hi Steph, hi Rod.

Welcome to the show today.

It's good to see you guys.

Well, I'd like to hear more about your backgrounds and hear what brought you to

this space of supply chain and logistics.

And for each of you I'd love for you to take me to that moment when you said

this is kind of what I want to focus on.

I really, this is, this is important to me and I want to spend my time doing this.

I was introduced, it was called logistics back then in the MBA program.

And I had gone to go get my MBA at Tennessee thinking that I was gonna

be a marketing or finance professional and fell in love with logistics,

especially when I realized it was a lot more than just being a truck driver.

And I've been doing it ever since, either in industry or now as a professor.

Supply chains make the world a better place.

It's the ultimate source of competitive advantage.

And I love talking about it, teaching it, working with students and industry

partners.

Excellent.

So I got into the field for a practical reason.

I fell in into it kind of like Rod did in grad school and I wanted a job afterwards.

And the university of Tennessee had a great program at the time.

And my parents didn't want me to come back home and live in their basement.

And so I thought maybe I should try this out.

And then what I found is one, I really enjoyed the classes and the,

as Rod mentioned, the complex problem solving and, and those pieces of it.

But I, I fell in love with the relational piece of it.

And some of those other things I went and did a summer internship, and

that's where kind of the classroom pieces all kind of came together.

And I said, you know, this is what I, I wanna do.

This is where I can look and know that I'm making an impact on an organization.

And that's kind of where the, the journey started for me.

I

love it.

And you talked a little bit about relationship in there

knowing your background.

Uh, we'll get to that because I think there's so much about, uh, supply

chain logistics is about relationship, but I wanna start with really

something, maybe you mentioned Rod

it was like, they think, I thought it was about driving trucks.

One of the things I've learned from working with the Walton college and

the esteemed faculty is the importance of definitions as you guys know.

And so I'm gonna ask you straight up.

Well, how would you define, uh, supply chain logistics if that's

the right phrase, which I think it is as we're talking about today,

from what I would've thought about it five years ago, ten years ago.

What I think about today it's changed.

And so I'd love to know how do you define it?

And what's, what's in the scope.

If you want an academic definition, it's three or more organizations

connected by the upstream and downstream flows of products, services,

information, and finances from point of origin to point of consumption.

That's the academic stuff.

Okay.

If you ask me to explain it, like I explained to grandma, we're all

about getting the right products at the right place at the right time.

As far as scope, you know, there's a planning function, we source things,

we make things and we move things and we've gotta integrate all those pieces.

So when I first talked about.

I thought, I, I thought it was originally just being a truck driver.

That's just the move piece, but there's, there's transformational processes.

There's sourcing, there's a plan to pull all that stuff together.

Supply chains have been around since the beginning of time.

We just didn't manage them very well.

We didn't think about them as supply chains.

We treated them as individual pieces.

So it's through the integration over the last couple decades

where we realize the true value of making that overall system better.

Rather than just focusing on individual pieces.

Well, and it's interesting you put it that way because if I didn't know better, it

would almost sound like that's something totally within one company's control.

And so Steph, you talked about relationships.

Yeah.

How does that definition of supply chain logistics?

How do you look at it in the context of the larger ecosystem?

So, as rod mentioned, when he did the academic definition, starting

with three or more organizations that plants that seed of it is a connection

of organizations working together.

And his, he said like point of origin, that's where the raw materials come out

of the ground however they are created.

To the point where you and I go buy something off the shelf at the store,

very few companies do all of that.

You know, maybe a farmer has his own stand and sells his,

his produce or, or something.

But for the most part, we need a lot of companies to do that.

And maybe a company does all a lot of the making or even selling.

But they may need to get that something somewhere where there is a truck driver

that needs to be in, in play there.

So you mentioned the term logistics and where Rod was kind of talking about

the, the supply chain side of things.

A lot of what we think about with logistics is how do we day to day do the

things that supply chains need us to do.

And we'll say things like getting the right product to the right place at the

right time, in the right quantity, in the right condition, those types of things.

That's what logistics does.

And what logistics is really doing is making the strategy that an entire

supply chain has come together.

And it's so all those different organizations work together.

And sometimes I'll tell my students it's about managing relationships,

managing risk, and managing trade offs to manage those trade

offs and to manage those risks.

You need to have relationships within your own organization and relationships

across organizations as well.

That's really helpful.

And I, I guess one of the questions I have around a supply chain logistics

and, and what's in the scope.

Is in this area of forecasting because it, it would seem to me the old school way

of thinking, perhaps that your starting point is you get a forecast of some

sort, but as we've seen with COVID and we've seen with, um, in the last couple

of months, actually, uh, as we record this, the ability to forecast change

in consumer behavior and how that feeds the whole process is really fundamental.

How much is the discipline of forecasting included in the way

you look at supply chain logistics?

It's huge.

When I refer to the planning piece, it starts with some idea of what

do we think demand's gonna be?

Because then we build our supply chains around that in terms of

capacity and capabilities with that said, every forecast is wrong.

They're never gonna be right.

If we had perfect forecasts, we wouldn't need supply chain managers, everything

would just be a planning function.

Right.

Everybody put their orders in.

A year in advance and everything would flow seamlessly and would work out it's

these big fluctuations in demand that weren't predicted that have caused us so

many problems, especially recently, right.

COVID hit.

So we had some structural problems with facilities shut down, but a lot

of demand patterns changed overnight.

And those changes really stressed supply change because they weren't

built for those type of demand patterns.

Is demand forecasting, something that's included in the scope academically of

helping, uh, students develop a degree in a specialty in supply chain logistics.

Absolutely.

We have that on the books.

They have a dedicated class that we call plan: forecasting

and inventory management.

Hmm.

So we, we, that's a separate class.

It's such a core function.

It is fundamental to everything we do.

But Andy bringing that up is, and Rod's alluded to this, what we've always

done, doesn't work in this environment.

And so COVID has kind of had everybody throw out the rule book and companies are

struggling because they have access to more data than they've ever had before.

Yet they're not necessarily incorporating that data in a meaningful way to

create meaningful forecast that would allow them to adjust and make

changes when something like nobody could see, like how, what, what's the

change a global pandemic's gonna do?

That's outside the scope of what might be a normal change, uh, you

know, an ice storm or bad traffic in Atlanta or something causing a delay.

Shouldn't be a big impact.

We should be able to adjust some things on that.

Our current models have been like, Hey, you know, we did this last year.

We're gonna bump it up 10% and that's gonna be our forecast for next year.

And we've got to become more, much more sophisticated and, and some

companies are trying to get there, but there's a lot of opportunities

in the realm of, of forecasting.

To make some really interesting changes based on what's happened within, in COVID.

We, we need some great talent to come in and kind of rethink how we've been

evaluating, uh, demand forecasting.

It, it sounds like a bit of an academic challenge too, because if you look at

demand forecasting, nothing's really changed systemically with consumer

buying patterns until COVID hit.

And now all of a sudden, even your base data that you're using

for historical is compromised.

And so I don't think I've met yet a, uh, supplier working with retail

that isn't struggling with trying to find their path on what's the right.

You know, demand forecast.

You try to use a two year stack and level out the, his, like,

pretend nothing ever happened.

Then look at, you know, what's happened in this spring of 2022

where, you know, retailers were caught off guard on consumer

buying patterns absolutely changed.

You got earnings misses on almost every major retailer because of inflation.

How do you factor in forecasting when you don't, you can't see.

The impact of inflation and all the things that's changed consumers so fast.

That's where we gotta be resilient and responsive.

And historically we haven't had to do that because we relied

on pretty good forecasts.

The last two years of all the demand data it's garbage right

now, you can't really trust it.

Because COVID because consumer patterns shifted.

One of the things we always hear about talking with suppliers

is what was a permanent demand change and what was temporary.

So for instance, consumers, we went and bought up and hoarded toilet paper.

That was not a permanent change in buying patterns for that particular product.

But you look at a Clorox whipe, they see the spike in demand,

and now they're questioning.

Is that gonna last forever or not?

Maybe something like that probably will fundamentally change.

I can see hand sanitizer being the same way.

Are we gonna be more germ conscious?

So some of these categories, it's a permanent change.

Some of them it isn't.

And then to your point, you throw inflation in there.

So we're shifting buying patterns now just because of the money

we do and don't have access to.

So it's gonna be tough.

It, our supply chains were designed over the last couple decades to be

very efficient and drive down costs.

We did not focus as much on resilience and risks, and then

we got hit with a bunch of them.

So we

did you think resilience is the new efficiency?

No.

I think the supply chains we have in place were built to be efficient.

We didn't think as much about resilience.

We just assumed we were very agnostic to risk.

If you will.

A number of those things have hit now.

I hope we keep resilience always in the back of our mind.

At one point you said is resilience the new black.

I, I don't know if it's the new black.

I think efficiency always will be, but I hope it's a khaki or a charcoal gray

that we always have in our closet.

So we could always go back to, we can't look at the supply chains as

just one dimension of performance.

It really needs to be cost, service, and resilience.

And, and you throw in sustainability in there too.

And historically we've not designed our supply chains with all four

of those dimensions in place.

And there's an orientation too, for managers to do this.

They need to think about supply chains differently.

Look at sourcing professionals for decades.

They've been incentivized to get the lowest cost per unit.

Well, the easiest way to do that is get more and more volume

to one supplier and economies.

A scale say we'll get a lower price.

Well, enough people do that over time.

You see entire industries where critical components are sourced from one region

of the world that drove down cost.

It was very efficient to do.

The problem is when a pandemic or something happens in that region.

The whole world struggles with product availability, whether it's microchips,

whether it's sunflower or oil right now in the Ukraine for baby formula.

Right.

We, we have we're, we're experiencing all the effects of

sourcing more and more volume from fewer and fewer suppliers

and fewer and fewer locations.

So that trade off between cost and resilience comes into play and

we're seeing it day in and day out.

So structurally we have that in place, but even the orientation, we

gotta re incentivize the way we push these sourcing managers to think

it's not just about lowest cost.

They need to think about revenue continuity.

They need to be customer centric and think about how does a

customer use this product.

What are the service implications of not having this on the shelf?

It's very different to be outta stock on, potato chips, which sunflower oil is

a key product and baby formula, right?

To me, I think we need to think of our supply chains.

We gotta look at the products and how customers use those.

And we need to segment our supply chains and treat them differently based on how

customers are impacted by those products.

So for life saving and life sustaining products, medicine, food, water,

I absolutely think we need to make sure resilience is top of mind.

How do you, um, I guess I'd look at this and say, what you're describing is really

hard to solve for one company at a time.

And we look maybe Steph at the relationships that are required between

suppliers and retailers, but even, even more than that, perhaps even

governments, you know what, who's the watchdog because it looks baby formula,

you know, as an example.

One could argue, there's been a great benefit to lowered cost

by that focus on efficiency that many more people be able to afford

baby formula than could have been.

So is it all wrong to have been focused on efficiency or, you know, but how do

you then protect the resiliency required?

So you don't have this huge problem we're having and what kind of

partnerships are gonna be required?

Because it feels to me, that's bigger than just a retailer, or two treating

their supplier differently and asking better questions on, is this gonna,

is this ask, gonna put you into too much of a consolidated risk?

Is there a government function that deals with supply chain vulnerabilities?

I, I don't know if there is or isn't, that's what, I'm kind

of curious what you think.

It's a great question.

And I think that's a, an issue there's been a lot of conversation about, of

what role does government play in, in parts of supply chain to Rod's point,

there are certain segments that we need to protect more than others for, for the

health wellbeing of all across the globe.

And then there's others that maybe we don't need to have, uh, influence.

It it, you, the government piece is it's, that's a, that's a tough one

that that's a tough one to, to solve.

But as Rod mentioned earlier, supply chains are all about

solving complex problems.

So supply chain managers and the organizations working together

have been solving complex problems.

As long as they've been around.

We just are more aware of them now than we ever have been before.

And that we have felt the pain in ways that we never have before.

You look at supply chain development.

I don't see that as a short term problem.

I mean, it, it, because of the capital investment required to build supply

chains, these things don't these fluctuations in, in, uh, challenges should

be something a bit more forecastable if that's a word, we should be able to see

the, into the future a bit better, because we don't have, you know, you can't just,

you know, switch things off and on.

I was listening to a podcast this week around the shortage in mining of

rare earth materials that are required for electrification of our, of the

industries, with all kinds of things, from turbines to, you know, electric cars,

EV ,you know the raw materials of that.

Where's that mining being done?

And how much of that mining's gonna be part of what's available

in the us versus what's gonna be, you know, available in China?

And what is that, what kind of vulnerabilities that put us in

and is it an existential issue?

Well, that's, you know, it would take years and year, decades

maybe to work out the supply chain implications of solving that.

So we have our own, uh, supply at a national level.

Uh, so I, I guess my question is it feels like this, uh, supply chain has been

pushed to the top of everyone's agenda yet these are decades in the making.

So where is that?

I guess, you know, is this what the conversation's happening in

academia around the longer term things or how much of it is trying

to help solve the short term?

There, there's obviously a mix of, of both and that we're constantly having to kind

of pivot back and forth, but you mentioned how many things could we actually are.

Forecastable if you look at a lot of big box retailers and let's just take

natural disasters like hurricanes.

They have a ton of history on what happens when a big storm hits and they know

down to the type of product, what people need pre-storm what people need during

the storm, what people need post storm.

They know when the insurance checks are gonna come in and

then they know they can back up.

This is the first part of the remodel that somebody's gonna do.

This is the second part, right?

That.

But that's, they've been working on that for a long time.

So they stage stuff around the Southeastern part of the United States,

you know, there's generators and, and, and things sitting around waiting until

they're they're needed there's history.

So they have figured out how to adapt to that.

We don't have the luxury of time of figuring that out, given what we've been

through, but it, when you look at how much has moved through supply chains throughout

COVID and especially the, the huge push to online shopping and at home delivery

and stuff, supply chains have actually moved way more through them than what

they ever had before, which is kind of amazing given all the other constraint.

We just focus on what it wasn't able to do for us.

Yeah.

For me as an individual consumer, when I went to the store and couldn't

buy X, that's where I felt the pain.

And so that's what I focused on.

Not all of the other stuff, you know, I'm still amazed at how many restaurants

that all they had ever done were dine in, uh, you know, seating it and have people

come into the restaurant and they pivoted and did, you know, take out, carry out

online orders kind of almost overnight.

They kind of rebuilt their business at the beginning of COVID.

Because that was survival.

And, and they do so companies are, are coming up with new and innovative ways.

But when we look at it on a, on a grand scale, yes, there are big

issues, but there are a lot of people doing some really great

things and, and working together throughout the supply chain to try to

have better conversations.

And you mentioned earlier, like asking the right questions or,

or sharing the right information.

A lot of times we've wanted to hoard information so that we, we didn't

want it to be used against us.

And we found out a lot of times that we, when we open up these conversations,

that gives us opportunities to create new ways to solve problems

and new opportunities for value.

Yeah, that that's a great perspective.

Uh, one of the things I care a lot about is customer centric leadership,

customer centricity, as an idea.

And I think a lot of people probably, maybe underappreciate how much

supply chain logistics has done.

Even in the last couple of years of providing innovation,

that is very customer centric.

And you think about customer centricity, a lot of people think of call centers,

just like Rod you said truck drivers to product supply, you know, uh, call

centers is what or customer experience, but, but actually being customer centric

that last mile delivery and all the pivoting, the QR codes for menus, you

know, QR, code's been around a long time, but I mean, being able to innovate.

Uh, to me it feels like most innovation toward being customer centric is

coming from supply chain, logistics, thinkers, and doers, more so than

marketing or you know, other components.

And so when you talk about innovation, especially if

I'm putting my retailer hat on.

Um, you really do need partnerships through the supply

community to pull that off.

And so I'd love to hear your thoughts around innovation in this space, because

capital's in is big capital investments a lot of times, and probably those

restaurants, Stephanie, that were experimenting with takeout and pick up

and were probably further along than those that haven't even got off the dime.

Right.

So how do you guys see innovation in this space?

Let me go back to the customer centricity piece.

That's why supply chains exist.

We lose sight of that sometimes we think it's a cost center.

We think it's a way to drive down prices.

Supply chains have always existed to serve customer needs.

And as long as we have that right orientation, we're gonna be customer

centric to your point on innovation,

um, nobody goes at it alone anymore.

The unit of analysis, the, the strategic competitors out there.

Are no longer individual companies.

Walmart doesn't compete against Amazon.

It's Walmart and 10,000 of their best friends and their supply chains

competing against Amazon and all their suppliers and their supply chains.

So it is supply chain against supply chain.

That's really the dynamic.

And that's where you're seeing a lot of the innovation occur.

Yes, the retailers can drive some of that.

Yes, they could push suppliers to be more innovative.

Sometimes those suppliers are coming in with really innovative

solutions to come help drive that.

And it's a team effort and, you know, we use the term chain cuz every link matters.

It's a team.

It nobody's gonna deliver on that innovation promise.

Nobody's gonna deliver on being customer centric unless they have key partners

throughout that supply chain, all pulling together in the same direction.

Are you guys seeing examples where collaboration between retailer suppliers?

Um, in general, I'm just industrywide is, is taking bigger steps forward.

Because I know sometimes these go through cycles and it's, you know,

let's, let's build collaborativly together to solve problems.

For example, R F I D, and when that first came through, I know the university

of Arkansas played a key role in helping the industry sort that out.

But where do you think collaboration is today and where do you see it going?

I'd say it's not where it needs to be.

I think there are pockets that are working together and are, are seeing the value

and the benefit, but we're still as

I mentioned kind of previously the, the trusting each other with sharing

information and sharing data and sharing our ideas without the fear

that it's going to be used against us, it is, is still kind of out there.

Um, to me, and this is a little outside of the, the, the

retail kind of side of things.

If you look at something like what JB hunt has done with their 360,

we're basically it, it's kind of an open source platform that any truck

driver can use to, to pick up loads.

I'm sure JB hunt has built in there that, that there's some benefit to them, but

that's also opening up opportunity for other people that isn't for their drivers.

That's a collaboration and that's a change that's going on in that industry

that if they didn't kind of push that.

Somebody else might have down the road, but they were the first ones to kind

of say, you know, let's, let's try this app idea and see if we can actually meet

the needs of all of our customers more than just our "core JB hunt customers".

And I think we're gonna see more ideas and concepts like that, uh, within

organizations, but we've gotta get past the old school mindset of if I give you

information, you're gonna exploit me.

Well, and I just, uh, heard an example this week of a particular retailer,

not, not Walmart, not, not any of the big boxes, but a retailer that is

really look at the supply chain cost of certain types of loads, getting to their

DC, and then putting a cost analysis against that and charging back suppliers

higher fees, if you will, for that.

And to me, that fee, I understand it.

And I, it, it kind of makes sense, but it doesn't sound like a, how

could we drive mutual value creation and joint costs down together?

That's a different idea, I think, than looking at your supply chain

and saying, where can I move cost?

Did it, do I have that right, or is that, am I just being naive?

No, you, you have it exactly right.

Of, are we reducing costs or just shifting costs?

I think that's a, that's a fair question.

Right, and a, a lot of times cost savings are really just cost

shifting and it always seems to go back further up the supply chain.

Um, with that said, it's really hard for a retailer to get product on the

shelves for customers if their suppliers aren't shipping 'em on time and complete.

And you, I get both sides of that debate.

Right.

If we're in a relationship, it shouldn't be punitive, but

you're really penalizing me.

If you're not shipping me on time and complete.

So it's tough.

I, I I've seen those where they work, where there's a little

bit of give and take on that.

I've seen that where that's part of the broader overall negotiation.

You come to me in a line review and you're pitching new products,

then let's bring up this, "can you ship them on time" type thing.

I think you need to look at all those pieces holistically.

And again, it all goes back to that shelf at the end of the day,

that's where the suppliers and retailers have common interests.

If it's not right for consumers, if it's not customer

centric, why are you doing it?

And you know, you might have different approaches from there, but as long as

that final shelf availability, it's there when the customer needs it.

Right quantity, right shape, right everything.

That's what should drive what they're doing in these relationships.

But Andy, what you're bringing up too about cost though, is a lot of times,

um, we don't really always have the best grasp on all the costs involved

somewhere in, in pricing structure.

And, and there's a lot of, what ifs out there or things that we

just don't know how to quantify.

So that brings another kind of wrinkle into it.

And then, you know, if we're gonna be this team throughout the supply chain,

if any one part of that team gets really greedy on the financial side of it.

Then maybe we don't sell as much at the end because we've,

out-priced the customers and stuff.

And so there's, there's kind of that whole, and people don't want, like to

talk about the, the money side of it, but it it's everybody, you know, if a

bottle of water costs me $10, unless I'm really dehydrated at a hot August

football game, I'm not gonna pay that.

But if everybody kind of has to keep in line too, with that whole costing

structure, as it, it goes to Rod's point to be something that somebody is willing

to pay when it gets to the retail shelf.

Well, and that brings up a, a really interesting point because if we really

priced out, per order the cost of last mile delivery versus that cost being

absorbed into the company in some way, somehow, uh, whether it's through

advertising spends or, you know, whatever you kind of wonder would the consumer.

You know, what would their appetite be for that?

I understand why no retailer would want to do that.

But I mean, do you ever think, or do you see a world where those, the scaling of

last mile delivery service would have a.

Huge or, uh, impact on margin reduction of that cost.

Cuz those cost structures to me seem hard to see scale benefits.

I, I don't know.

So I mean, where do you see that last mile delivery cost engineering

supply chain ever really going?

, I'm gonna give you an opinion here.

And it's a strong one.

Okay.

That last mile eCommerce model, in my opinion is not sustainable.

Right?

You don't make money on it.

The companies that do that right now are subsidizing it.

Amazon, they made 33 billion last year 31 came from retail media networks.

The other part came from Amazon web services target and

Walmart took a hit last week.

Earnings went down.

Well, coincidentally, their online sales kept going up, up, up, up, up.

It's a race to the bottom.

If you continue to push higher sales in that channel, that's

much more expensive to serve.

I have sustainability concerns about that from an environmental perspective too.

Well, I know rod, you've done some work in that space and I guess my question

is how much room do you think there is for further cost to have significant

cost optimization of that model, to where it does make more sense?

Or is this one that you think for the next five to 10 years,

it's gonna be where it is.

And if consumers understood those costs in environmental impact, Do you think

they might make a different choice?

Yes.

Maybe we have some research that shows that when we make them aware

of that last mile shipment of, if you do it in a rush manner, if you

wanna get it overnight, that has a much broader environmental impact.

Then if you're willing to wait a week and we see that'll shift their

behavior, because consumers are much more environmentally conscious collectively

than what they have been in the past.

I I'm not an engineer.

And I can tell you, I, I don't know all the ins and outs of exact

measures for carbon footprints.

I think everybody's trying to come up with a way to do that.

Cause then you could put that into your cost equations, figuring out different

channels to deliver these things.

Um, that's where we're showing a lot of the attempts at innovation

come into place, whether it's with drone delivery, whether autonomous

driving trucks, a lot of those things.

Short of a technological breakthrough, in my opinion, again, we're gonna

struggle with the math, the, the, the profitable delivery.

It's not profitable to deliver every single day to your house, an Amazon

box with deodorant and toothpaste.

And you might as well take a $10 bill to every one of those product.

When you do it that way.

And again, I know that's a strong opinion, but I, we we're seeing it.

Right.

We're seeing it in front of us, in the financial statements

that's buried in there.

Yeah.

Cause nobody's breaking it out very well, but it's just, that's a tough ask.

Yeah.

Well, you'd almost have to work inside some of these companies to

understand the actual details of how it really works, which brings to a

point of you both have very strong and, uh, senior level, uh, experience.

In industry in retail merchandising before really launching head on into

this academic chapter of your lives, how has that impacted the way you view

your job today from an academic remit?

And what would you be missing if you didn't have those experiences and came

straight, you know, grad school into PhD, and now, you know, a faculty level

professors in this space, how, how has that benefited or is it hindered or is

it, did, did it put you behind a few grades that you had to catch up in to

spend those extra years in industry?

Or has it helped?

Oh, I think it adds to the overall, um, my success as an academic is having

that industry experience, especially, and I'll kind of go the classroom

environment to be able to tell students, you know, talk about forecasting.

Well, when I was at Lowe's as a merchandiser, this is how we did

it, you know, instead of here's an archaic formula that I'm gonna

show you how to do something.

And that really helps the light bulbs go on and helps them visualize.

This is something that I would do instead of having to guest speakers are great.

But instead of having to bring in guest speakers to fill out that

round out that knowledge and stuff, I think it's very beneficial.

You know, in the classroom.

I think Rod and I both on maybe a research side had to go through a little bit of,

I won't say unlearning, but a shift in perspective because academic research

is, is supposed to be very theoretical.

But I, I also know for Rod and I it's been important to make sure that we felt

like the research that we do does have industry relevancy, because we didn't

feel like we could look at some of our friends prior to academia in the eye.

If we didn't try to do something that we realized, this is something

that would be of value back when I was sitting in that, in that role.

Um, I, I don't, I think there's the only thing is time is, you know, how

much time it takes to get through masters in PhD programs and stuff.

And so you sacrificed some time in this career.

I don't know that I would've made this career change.

Had I not had the industry experience?

Yeah.

Because actually the industry and the experience kind of created the

curiosity and interest to go down the academic path, and then also it

enables me to help fuel the fire with students and that this is a career.

This is somewhere that they can go in and be successful and speak to

them in language that's going to help them down the road instead of

teaching them terms and things and definitions that are gonna be archaic.

Well, that's really interesting.

And I guess from my perspective, uh, being more of an industry person, obviously,

but, and now getting to work with the university more, really having a much

higher appreciation for the freedom to take a longer view because the challenge

we have on just trying to solve these within the product supply organization

of company A or B is the short term ism and, you know, eventually focusing either

on efficiency or some kind of change and not really being able to step back

and look at the bigger picture, look at, you know, where are we gonna get the

raw materials for evolving industries and what kind of theory should drive

our decision making and framework.

So I think that's the, the benefit that academia brings to these challenges.

That probably if you're in the, in the grind of a retail job

every day or a supplier's job, You don't really appreciate that.

It's like, you just gotta survive this week and, um,

You don't have the time cuz you're putting out the fires everywhere.

It's a lot of fire fighting, right?

And I think good managers, they fight the fires day in, day out.

They also figure out how to prevent them within their own organizations.

What we're fortunate we can do is we get to study fire prevention across multiple

companies or multiple industries and find what's common across those or different.

So, and you you're right.

Andy, you get the time to.

To look at it closely.

I remember when I first got promoted to manager, my first VP said he is like,

you're trying to be perfect on everything.

He's like be 80% there, pull the trigger and go onto the next thing.

Whereas academics are

That doesn't work for you, right?

I mean, if you submit something to a journal that's 80% right.

And say, look, man, we're not trying to be perfect here.

Would that fly?

No, no, it's just the opposite.

Right?

We gotta be the 99% level of certainty, whereas an industry, how many industry

problems, can you be that certain and take the time to be that certain?

So it's an interesting trade off, but I love being on both sides of that fence.

Yeah.

That's exciting.

Uh, so as you guys look to the future, ask both of you this question, uh, and

you look at supply chain logistics, the craft you guys have developed

and where the world is today.

We're fighting wars over.

Supply chains in some ways, what brings you hope?

What, what are you most excited about when you look out into the future and

think about the problems to be solved and, and how we might approach it?

So , the cliche probably answer is the students that I get to work with.

Is watching the light bulb go off and them like, wow.

One, I really love the problem solving piece of it.

I, I, I wanna make a difference in a company.

I wanna work with other people and engage in stuff.

So the future, in terms of who's coming into the workforce, there's some amazing

bright, young minds who are excited about tackling these, these challenges.

And, and we need that because there's a lot of people that have

been doing this for a long time.

And especially after the last few years, they are tired and worn out.

Yeah.

And so we need some fresh perspectives and fresh ideas and, and stuff.

And so I'm, I'm gonna keep it with, with that side of it and let Rod do

something much more, uh, intellectual.

I I'm sure, but I love that.

Um, and, and I connect with students beyond just the university of Arkansas.

And we are really starting to attract top talent into the supply chain field.

Yeah, you're really passionate about also, uh, getting female

leaders into this space, uh, and have done a great job at that.

Uh, tell me more about how you approach that and, and what's your

message to, uh, which feels like has been a male dominated, uh, sector,

um, to get, to get women more excited about the opportunity in this space.

Well, ironically enough back when Rod was working on his PhD and I was took a

few years off to stay home with my kids.

He was the only male professor at the time in the department.

And he would have female students that would want to ask him questions.

And in some cases, There were questions they didn't feel comfortable asking.

In some question cases, there were answers he didn't feel comfortable giving.

And so he kind of did the, Hey, why don't you call my wife and have coffee with her?

And cause one, it gets me out of the house and I got to have some great

conversations, but two, it, it gave them an opportunity to talk to someone that

they felt could relate to their questions and that kind of planted the seed.

And then, I had some conversations where there were some students that said,

and I've told this story to people, uh, so they probably get tired of it

sometimes, but that female students would say going to supply chain classes

was like going to a fraternity party.

You were either hit on or ignored.

And I thought.

Ooh, this is, this is a problem.

We wanna try to, to do something, um, about this.

And one of the ways to do something about that is to get

more women interested in it.

I also had done some research that said by the time they graduated,

female supply chain majors were less confident in their choice of

major than their male counterparts.

And as I was digging a little deeper.

A lot of times that coincided with their upper division classes where they

started looking around and going a lot of business schools are pretty 50, 50.

So early on, you don't know there's a difference.

It's not till you get later that you see, oh wait where did all the girls go?

Kind of thing and then they'll go to a summer internship or two, and then

they look around and go, wow, there are no women leaders or there's no other

females on, on this team and stuff.

And so there's kind of a lot of times a question of, am

I making the right decision?

Am I going into the right field?

So part of my work here with the university has been through an

organization called WISE which stands for women impacting supply chain excellence.

And the whole premise behind it is to try to build up and create

a network to encourage and empower young women that, yes, this is

a, a great way to have a career.

And by the way, we have young men that are part of it too, who are gonna be

amazing allies when they get out there and work with their female colleagues

and, and become managers and stuff.

Because we do have a labor shortage in supply chain.

So we need more people coming into the field.

Um, we can't just try to bring on the dudes.

We need to bring as as many people as we can in it.

And I also believe that the more women you bring in those women

are also gonna represent all other types of diversity as well.

And so that while creating gender, trying to get to gender balance,

you're also increasing all other types of diversity as well.

Yeah, I think that's amazing and, and very helpful.

And if you look at, um, most retail organizations that are at

the tail end of some of the supply chain challenges, having a diverse

perspective on what is this decision about stocks means to the consumer?

And really understanding the different elements of it than just, you know, a

single male perspective all down the chain, you know, it's, uh, It's it's

you, you, I think you come up with different answers, you know, if you were

to ask me what's the, um, importance of building supply chain around making sure

we have toilet paper versus my wife.

I'd say they're substitutes and, and, and she would see it differently.

Uh, and so I think, you know, but you have to have that, that diversity of

perspective, especially as supply chains that move through retail and touch

consumers, you must have diversity in all aspects or you're gonna, so

you're really gonna run into some real.

Blind spots, but so good on you for doing that.

I think that's a fantastic program and, uh, you're highly recognized

one of the top 100, uh, female leaders in supply chain logistics.

I've read.

So, um, keep doing what you're doing.

That's fantastic.

Hey Rod what brings you hope?

Throughout history, our standard of living comes and goes with supply chains, right?

You, you look at anywhere in the world right now.

You show me a region of the world that's struggling, I'll show you

a region of the world that doesn't have good supply chains in place.

So we have a long history and tradition of supply chain solve problems and

increase the standard of living.

We'll figure things out.

We got a lot of people in this discipline that will move mountains.

To put out the fire every day.

And at the same time, we have more and more people taking the long view

of it to study these problems and prevent them from ever happening.

Um, I love the idea that it's multiple companies, multiple organizations,

government, industry, key stakeholders throughout the world, coming together

to solve these problems, to ultimately get us the products we need and

want when and where we need them.

So I have tremendous faith.

I don't know the answers of how we're gonna do it, but, supply

chain management at its core of leveraging those relationships and

coming together to figure out trade offs and balance all that out.

It's a proven recipe for success and we're getting well.

I love the fact that the, um, university of Arkansas is number one supply chain

school in the, in the country, but it also feels to me like that, that opportunity

for longer term systemic change is a great place for universities to play a

leadership role because, uh, and probably quite frankly, as you guys have pointed

out a lot of supply chain people today in, in business have just been overwhelmed

with the urgent last couple of years of solving impossible, short term problems

and have done a great job at that.

But that longer term view is one I think the university's starting to,

to the university of Arkansas for sure, is, is leading the way in that.

So, uh, hopefully we'll see more of that as we move into the future.

Can I throw this in too Andy?

Yeah.

If companies are gonna be customer centric.

They have to have that long term supply chain view, right?

If, if you , if you're not just saying it, if you truly care about your customers

and getting them what they need when and where they need it, you have to

have that long term supply chain view.

Um, to me that they're not, they're not different entities.

They go hand in hand supply chain management to me is the tool

to deliver on customer centric promises that marketing comes up.

Yeah, well, I, you know, I had the benefit of spending four

years in the UK where it's a very different culture in some ways.

And, uh, the movement against plastics, uh, happened very quickly and we had

a real shortage and from a supply chain standpoint of being able to get

even fresh product, um, that's, wasn't packaged in plastic, uh, through the

supply chains and, and being able to do that and the innovation, uh, didn't have

the technology to solve the problems.

And so, uh, I know at ASDA we put together some innovation funds with

support suppliers, startup suppliers, to help solve the problem of how could

we reduce plastic in packaging so that we could, you know, move that product

through the systems and not create

more food waste on the back end, uh, because that's a supply, you know,

that's a, that's a problem as well.

And so maybe perhaps on solving these bigger problems, we'll see even more

innovation cuz some of the problems we should be taking on, we don't know

the answers to yet and it's gonna take innovation to really solve it.

Well, you mentioned the electrification of everything.

We do not have supply chain capabilities in place right now for every one of us

to be driving around an electric vehicle.

But as we push more for that supply chain people will figure it out.

We will find more sources of supply.

We will find better and more efficient ways to refine that.

We'll make it happen.

It won't be instantaneously.

There might be some pain points from time to time and COVID has shown us that,

but it's been amazing what supply chains have done over the last couple of years.

And that that's what brings me hope.

If a supplier's listening to this and they've got some supply chain challenges,

I mean, what do you say to industries that might be looking around or companies

for who can help and specifically like the Walton college of business.

Here's your sales pitch chance, uh, for future students and

industry to partner with the Walton college in supply chain logistics.

There's a shortage of talent in supply chains right now, if you want fresh new

ideas and the most recently trained, developed partnerships with key

universities, and yes, we have one of the top ranked programs in the world.

And we're very proud of it.

And we think we offer a great program.

There's a lot of other good schools out there too.

So.

True partners in academia that help you and that'll help

you with the talent piece.

If you have mid-level people, we have a great Ms program.

Now we can do a lot of executive training and things like that.

So there are additional opportunities to refine that skill set and

develop those capabilities.

And then the big problems we, we like to do research, we have to do research.

If you have a big problem.

Seems to permeate across suppliers, reach out to the university and see if

they have researchers that are willing to dedicate time and effort to that.

I, I don't know of any researchers.

If you come to them with data on something they're interested in,

that would turn you down or turn you away, especially if you wanted.

No, they don't exist.

They don't exist.

Exactly.

That forecast I could tell you is 100%.

That's a hundred percent accurate forecast.

I love it.

Well, thank you both.

You guys have been wonderful and I can't wait to get this out

and share it with folks and, uh, I really appreciate your time.

It's been fantastic.

It was a pleasure talking with professors Rodney and Stephanie Thomas today in a

time when most discussions focus on the shortcomings of supply chains, it was

refreshing to speak to experts who see hope for continued innovation and success.

Thanks to both Rodney and Stephanie for sharing their time and passion

for creating a brighter future and for their continued investment in the

next generation of business leaders at the Walton college of business.

That's it for this episode of it's a customer's.

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